8 FinTech Companies Leading the Charge in 2021

The sharp growth of fintech, particularly over the past year, has brought many of the industry’s rising startups front and center on the radar of venture capitalists as well as companies seeking to make strategic acquisitions. Among the areas seeing the most growth have been payment tech, investment management and data security.

The trends have become even more pronounced during the pivot to remote work that saw companies seeking to automate, streamline and shore up vulnerabilities in their tech stack. Indeed, digital transformation rose to the top of the agenda for corporations and individuals alike during the pandemic. Amidst the surging growth of the fintech sector, here are a couple of the firms that tech observers should have on their radar.

1. EquityZen: EquityZen was founded in 2013, but has enjoyed the explosion in interest in pre-IPO investments more recently. The platform helps individual investors buy and sell stock in private, Pre-IPO companies, including some of the hottest tech startups in Silicon Valley.
2. CapLinked: The past year has seen a sharp ramp up in SPAC and M&A activity, as well as more information security risks than ever before due to much of the deal making taking place remotely. At the intersection of those two trends is CapLinked, the leading provider of virtual data rooms, which helps investment firms, banks and advisors securely review and share sensitive dealmaking documents.
3. Praxis: The housing shortage taking place in the US real estate market has highlighted the need for new construction that’s faster, lower cost and even environmentally friendly. Enter modular housing, which saw a resurgence over the past twelve months. As one of the nation’s leading modular housing producers, Praxis has developed some of the most cutting edge technology currently available in the space.
4. Stampli: Stampli is the leader in accounts payable automation, which helps companies manage, track and seamlessly pay invoices from vendors. Financial departments reached a new inflection point while working remotely as the already-onerous process of managing payables became even more difficult.
5. Fundera: As small businesses scrambled to secure funding to keep operations going during the height of the pandemic, Fundera’s lending marketplace entered the vernacular of millions of business owners. The company was acquired by NerdWallet in 2020 and is poised to expand its leadership as a go-to business lending hub.
6. Gemini: Perhaps one of the most well known platforms to buy and sell digital currencies such as Bitcoin and Ether, Gemini surged even more so in popularity as a new wave of investors entered cryptocurrencies during the pandemic and the asset prices reached historic new highs.
7. Nubank: Nubank is often regarded as the largest fintech startup in Latin America. Founded in 2013, the company serves a staggering tens of millions of customers across LATAM providing digital banking solutions. They were selected by Forbes as one of the best banks in the world.
8. Riskified: Ecommerce was another major winner of 2020 and is on track to continue that winning streak in 2021. With so many new ecommerce businesses entering the hot market, one of the most consequential companies in the space has become Riskified. They provide fraud and chargeback prevention technology to ecommerce sellers, which helps protect them from losing money on fraudulent orders-- one of the top threats to ecommerce companies.